This weekend I will be celebrating a girlfriend’s birthday, next week my gorgeous nephew will turn 18, then it’ll be my turn (sob sob!), then my sissy turns 50 (Mexico here we come!), my aunt celebrates her 60th and later in the year my mum will turn 60 years young – that’s a whole lotta birthday cake!

So I felt inspired to find a fun alternative to the traditional birthday cake. My solution didn’t fall too far from the cake pan, but just a short hop away to my donut pan with these cute and delicious Baked Funfetti Birthday Doughnuts.

Bright, fun and filled with colorful funfetti sprinkles, these baked rings of brilliance are sure to receive a welcome reception at any birthday party, no matter what the age of the birthday boy or girl.

You can tailor the look of your doughnuts by adding different food colouring to the icing or by adding a sprinkle of glitter or coloured sugar.  Just be sure not to use nonpareils sprinkles in your batter mix, as they will bleed into the donuts and leave you with more of a tie-dye result, than a sprinkling of funfetti fabulousness.

Not only a feast for the eyes, this batter takes only 10 minutes to prepare and just 12 minutes to bake, so these doughnuts make a fast, fuss free – and totally cool – alternative to baking a traditional birthday cake. Better still, if your cake decorating skills leave a little to be desired, these doughnuts are a foolproof way to bake yourself to Mary Berry heights and they’ll be no anxiety over cutting equally sized slices of cake either – bonus!

This recipe makes 12 doughnuts, so you may need to use two doughnut pans, or use a single pan and bake two batches. First you’ll need pre-heat your oven to 350°F (180°C) and prep your pans by lightly greasing them with oil, butter or spray.

In the bowl of a stand mixer, using the paddle attachment, beat the eggs until blended. Then add the butter, vanilla extract and sugar and mix together until the mixture becomes smooth. In a separate bowl, combine the flour, baking powder and salt, and pour into the batter and combine. Now add the milk and stir until smooth. Finally, carefully fold in the sprinkles, making sure not to over mix them.

Spoon the batter into the oiled doughnut pans and bake for approximately 12-15 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean.

Remove your baked delights from the oven – yes, they look and smell awesome already don’t they? – leave them to cool for a few minutes and then tip them out onto a cooling rack to cool completely.

Now to make the ice, ice, icing baby!

Whisk together the powdered sugar, vanilla extract and milk. Add a couple of drops of food coloring – I used a touch of red on half of mine – and when the doughnuts are cool, cover them in the glaze and decorate with more rainbow sprinkle sunshine.